SPORT AND TRAVEL 157 



horns of wapiti and mule deer the former very 

 much preponderating in numbers now too Jay scat- 

 tered everywhere over the face of the country. These 

 horns were all bleached white, though most of them 

 were quite perfect and showed no signs of having 

 been gnawed by hinds or rats. They had all been 

 shed years ago during the annual migrations, when 

 the great bands of wapiti were returning in the 

 spring from their winter feeding-grounds in the Big- 

 horn Basin to the mountain forests where they lived 

 until once more driven to the lower and more open 

 ground by heavy snow-storms. Now no more wapiti 

 winter in the Bighorn Basin. Their place has been 

 taken by the settlers' stock; and the wild creatures 

 which the sheep and cattle have supplanted the 

 very few that still exist in this once magnificent hunt- 

 ing-ground have to pass the whole year as best 

 they can amongst the mountains. 



In the afternoon our route lay along the course of 

 Trapper's Creek, a mountain torrent which has cut 

 for itself a deep gorge or canyon of very remarkable 

 appearance and over one thousand feet in depth. 

 Wild sheep, I was told, were not long ago plentiful 

 amongst the precipitous rock walls, interspersed with 

 steep grass slopes, of this wild gorge, but I doubt if 

 any are left there now. Just before dusk we reached 

 Trapper's Creek below the mouth of the canyon, and 

 on the following day, September 4, we followed the 

 course of this stream to its junction with Shell Creek, 



